Conference championships will become more difficult to capture for Riverside-Brookfield High School sports teams next year. That’s because Glenbard South High School, located in Glen Ellyn, will be joining the Metro Suburban Conference next year in all sports but football. In 2011, Glenbard South will join the conference in football.
“They’ll be a great addition to our conference athletically,” said RB Athletics Director and head football coach Otto Zeman. “I think the addition of Glenbard South will add to the quality and depth of the conference. It’s going to be really good for our conference and it’s going to be good for RB.”
Glenbard South currently competes in the Western Sun Conference, with schools such as Geneva, Batavia and other schools even farther west such as Sycamore, DeKalb and Rochelle.
With the Western Sun breaking up after this school year, Glenbard South Athletics Director John Trieber was looking for a new conference. Glenbard South had competed with RB and other Metro Suburban schools in the old Suburban Prairie Conference, although Glenbard South and RB were in different divisions.
“We had to find a spot quick,” Treiber said last week. “We feel that with the less travel this is a good, viable conference for us to go to.”
Glenbard South will give the Metro Suburban seven schools next year. Illiana Christian and Timothy Christian joined the conference this year. Neither Illiana nor Timothy has football programs.
The addition of Illiana and Timothy Christian has already toughened up competition in the conference. This year, Illiana, with an enrollment of just 631 students, won four conference championships (boys golf, girls volleyball and boys and girls cross country), while RB won three conference championships (football-tied for first, boys soccer, and girls tennis).
The Metro Suburban would ideally like to add one more school to reach an even number to make scheduling easier. Scheduling issues are the main reason that Glenbard South will not be playing football next year in the conference.
“We wanted to, but I respect the conference decision on that because football is the hardest sport to schedule,” Treiber said. This season the Glenbard South football team went 9-3 and made it as far as the Class 5A state quarterfinals.
Glenbard South, with an enrollment of 1,449 students, is just about the same size as RB. With the recent addition of more classes in the state playoffs, RB and Glenbard South have often met in regional and sectional competition.
Last year Glenbard South defeated RB in football, boys basketball and softball in state tournament competition.
“I think it’ll be a nice rivalry developing because we’ve developed it in the regional and sectional,” Treiber said. “This way we’ll see them more in everything.”
